Reducing bureaucracy for public sector frontline staff: Briefing for the ...

10 Part One Reducing bureaucracy for public sector frontline staff
1.4 There is also a high level of press and public interest in the time spent by frontline
workers on administrative tasks. Public opinion seems to be generally that the volume
of bureaucracy is too high. For example there have been several press articles on the
amount of time spent by teachers and by police on administrative tasks.
1.5 To date there has been no systematic quantification of the costs that complying
with regulation imposes on frontline workers. However a few Departments have
produced their own estimates of the time spent on administration for some groups of
front-line staff (Figure 2).
1.6 More is known about the irritations frontline staff have often faced in dealing
with bureaucracy. Common irritants recorded by public sector staff in 2007-08
included a lack of coordination and data sharing between Departments, duplicate
information requests, longwinded processes and lack or poor use of information
technology (Figure 3). Many of the irritants below are now being addressed by the
Departments concerned.
1.7 A large number of bodies with slightly differing requirements can lead to
perceptions of bureaucracy in major service delivery sectors. For example one
individual in higher education commented in an online suggestions portal for staff that:
‘A significant number of organisations regulate Universities, all with different and often
duplicated data requirements and inspection regimes’ 4 Complex delivery chains and the
role of professional bodies often exacerbate the number of data requirements. Annex 1
shows the number of organisations involved in delivering the skills agenda to young
people in higher education in 2008 and their roles and responsibilities.
Figure 2
Estimates of time spent on administration by frontline workers
Policing: An annual activity based costing data exercise found that the police spent about half of their
time on frontline policing (excluding incident related paperwork) and aproximately a further 10 per cent of
time on incident related paperwork. Although the overall time spent on frontline policing increased from
63.6 to 64.9 per cent between 2003-04 and 2007-08, this increase actually represented an increase in
incident-related paperwork (from 10.3 per cent to 12.4 per cent), with time spent on frontline policing
excluding incident-related paperwork falling slightly.
Source: HC (2008-09) Written Answers, 15 May, 1088-89W
Education: A 2008 Teachers’ Workload Diary Survey of 2000 teachers in England and Wales found that
full time primary and secondary school classroom teachers spend between 12 and 16 per cent of their
working week on administrative tasks and school management. The top activity teachers said they would
like to spend less of their time doing was administration and clerical work (for example this was mentioned by
34 per cent of primary full-time classroom teachers).
Source: http://www.ome.uk.com/downloads/2008%20Teachers%20Report%20FINAL.pdf
4 Better Regulation Executive Web Portal: Suggestions for Better Regulation http://www.betterregulation.gov.uk/
public/viewidea.cfmproposalid=c5f30c366aec4d0691b4fa3e7ec93aba&section=Public.